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the violin's revenge lymphoma and the violin |
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Through the many appointments with doctors and experts, I kept asking whether my occupation as violin player could have effected the diagnosis - non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma, stage IV. No, they said, the violin playing has nothing to do with it. On the other hand, no one knows why you get this kind of cancer; nothing to do with lifestyle, no proof of a genetic predisposition running in the generations, no evidence for environmental causes, age also not a significant factor. It just happens says the specialist, it's the random generator, your number comes up. But it's not like I play easy listening 'Mozak' on second violin in some orchestra; my music is generally quite vigorous stuff, it requires energy, there is stress on the body - especially on the neck, the arm, and the shoulder and the collarbone where the violin sits. And it's on the left side of my neck and down the left side of my upper chest where the tumours have piled up. The violin is pivoted in an arm-shoulder-neck fulcrum, an arc of intensity. No nothing to do with violin playing, the medical team is adamant. It is strange how people react to a terminal illness, some say that you must be pulling their leg, others ask if it hurts. Susan Sontag, the writer, survived 30 years with cancer and she wrote quite a book on the subject. Within the pages of 'Illness As Metaphor', you'll find the whole litany of metaphors by which we deal with our bodily malfunctions. Mostly she takes to task the way in which we always perceive illness as a fight, a struggle to the death against the invincible foe. A little like playing the violin then. Then a friend and colleague of mine, a double bass player as it happens, suggests 'It's the violin's revenge', and, in a slightly embarrassed way, he's not sure if it was a jest or a realistic observation. So you get to thinking, maybe he's right. I mean, this thing is going to kill you sooner or later, the doctors are all agreed on that. Supposing it is the violin and you stop playing it completely--could it add years to your life? Would you give it up if it added just one year to your life, six months? If it were sure that by giving up your instrument of choice, you could lengthen your span - what would you do? So after being blasted by radiation for four weeks, the tumours have dissolved. There's a bit of time to ponder this . . . could start playing the violin fiddle style with the instrument nesting lightly in your arm away from the neck. But then you can forget about playing at speed in the higher positions; that would be like playing half an instrument. You used to play a vertical violin bolted to an iron-frame and fitted with a bunch of extra strings (19 strings in all, same number as the basic radiation doses) another colleague reminds me. But it got stolen back in 1980, so there must have been a reason for that. The question remains - total violin playing or not at all? Oh Rose, thou art sick! The invisible worm, That flies in the night, In the howling storm, Has found out thy bed Of crimson joy, And his dark secret love Does thy life destroy. William Blake the music on this page comes from the LP VIVISECTION and features amplified 19 string cello and violin - recorded 1987 |
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